Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Sensational Salads

For my recent Italian dinner party, I made two sensational salads - Bill Granger's Rocket & Pumpkin Salad, pictured above, and Curtis Stone's Tomato Salad with Basil, Buffalo Mozzarella and Balsamic.Unfortunately, one of my guests was not a salad man, but I enjoyed the salads. It was a nice change from roast veges to go with my porchetta.To make the rocket & pumpkin salad (from the May 2007 edition of Delicious magazine), you will need:500g peeled pumpkin cut into 1.5cm cubes1 thinly sliced red onion1 teaspoon dried chilli flakes (I left these out)2 tablespoons olive oil sea salt (to taste)100g rocket leavesPreheat your oven to 220 degrees Celsius.Put all ingredients other than the rocket into a baking dish, toss to combine, and bake for 45 minutes or until the pumpkin is cooked through.Put the rocket into a salad dish, add the pumpkin mixture, and toss to combine. It's that simple!

To make the tomato, basil, mozzarella and balsamic salad (from the May 2008 edition of Delicious magazine), you will need: